Anonymous The Beginnings of an Ideal World At five years of age, I stopped watching the news. The only things on the news was death, destruction, violence, and pain. Even at the age of five, I knew that the world on the news was not the world I wanted to live in. “All of us carry a desire for a better way, a hope that we will somehow leave the world a better place than we found it,”( Gates & Kenison, 2002, p.XV). I kept hoping as a child that there would be some super hero that would come along and save us. As I grew older, I realized we are the ones here and now that make or break our reality. I discovered the power and benefits of meditation and prayer on myself, interpersonally, an organization, and even a whole city. What a Hopi elder said became painfully clear, “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for”( Gates & Kenison, 2002, p.7). I was blessed to be exposed and experience the benefits of different types of meditation and prayer in Nature at a young age. Nature, especially the ocean, was the first church I ever experienced. Prayer and meditation consisted of dancing, songs, walking, and chanting. I was bursting happiness and contentment. The Divine was everywhere and events happened all the time that were obvious messages and signs that a loving Being was present. Everyone and everything was apart of the Divine. The Hand out for the Color Purple (2005) speaks to this, “she, like Nature itself, is a radiant expression of the heretofore perceived as quite distant Divine,”( Psy 303, p. Xi). At this point, I still believed that I was a beautiful creation from God and was worthy like all others to receive love. I was forced to attend the Catholic church service when I was eight years old. This was a torturous experience in the beginning since I was used to the freedom of dancing in nature and at the non-denominational church. Soon, I learned the benefits of repetition in quiet, seated meditation. Even driving to mass began to trigger me to sink into this meditative state. This helped me learn to be completely present and still within myself. Mass taught me the value of having a sacred space. Now I benefited from being able to worship anywhere to having a tool to break through when I felt blocked from my spiritual connection. This communion in meditation and prayer became my saving grace. In a Reader from my Psychology of Yoga class(2005), there is an excerpt of Moving Into Stillness by Erich Schiffman that explains a purpose for meditation, “It’s about continuing to feel the energy you are made of and continuing to listen inwardly for guidance, as you get up and go about your business. It’s about being increasingly desirous of always wanting to know what God would have you do and of having no agenda other than being the place where clarity comes through” (p. 166). This was the only way I made it through my Catholic School experience. The only way I could see through my own pain was this meditation. I could see that it was their actions, not their true being that I did not love. This was profound for me. The peace and calm of meditation is contagious and extends from our self to others. There was one night when my parents had been yelling and fighting for a long time with no inclination to stop. I felt scared and sad for I was trembling. Then I had an idea! I began to meditate and pray extending the peace and love I felt slowly from my room to my side of the house to encompass them and the whole house. Something miraculous began to happen. Their voices slowly started to have less and less yelling in them. They began to sigh and take deeper breaths throughout the conversation. I do not know if their conflict was ever resolved, but the energy and the interactions in the house changed for that moment. Erich Schiffman excerpt stated that “Everything will begin to seem as though it’s made of the same energy, the same cloth”(p. 162) through meditation. The power of an individual to influence and affect others, especially child having and knowing the power to affect others because we are all one is incredible. This was a confirmation of what I always knew to be true; that love is powerful, more powerful than anger and hate. “Simple kindness to one’s self and all that lives is the most powerful transformational force of all…And its effect is as far-reaching as it is subtle”( Hawkins, 2002, p.128). This kindness became my practice in every day life. Gestalt therapy was a perfect example of how a group can help an individual and like wise. I took the Gestalt therapy class with Victor Daniels at Sonoma State University. I was excited by this group process and confused at how others did not feel comfortable with the idea of therapy in a group. Gestalt therapy usually involves a therapist and a “hot seat” that the patient sits in while others who may or may not later participate in therapy sit around them. The people in the group can be used as props in therapy to act out something or have dialog with them. I realized immediately how deep Gestalt goes and how quickly this occurs despite my reservations to approach deep subjects in front of a group. There is was such brutal honesty and vulnerability that came out in each session. The connection made more sense after comparing the basis of Gestalt therapy to meditation. Claudio Naranjo, M.D.,(1993) said that, “These three-an appreciation of actuality, of awareness, and of responsibility- constitute the core attitude of Gestalt therapy”(p.6). Awareness and seeking the Truth are present in this therapy as well as in meditation. Then to add a group of people to join the patient and observe and hold the truth with them creates quite a powerful entity that could be overwhelming or intimidating. My therapy experience in the group was quite moving. I saw each person as a part of me so it was not embarrassing to expose myself. In that space it was as Erich Schiffman said in the excerpt(2005), “’God’ is in everything you’re seeing, including yourself, and that God is all there is. An inherent oneness becomes obvious”(p. 162). As I was discovering the power of the group, I was elated to discover the DC study in the movie, “What the Bleep do we know!?”. In 1993, the DC project was a 2 month project that had a group of people trained in Transcendental Meditation that at the largest was 4,000 people in Washington D.C. to help reduce the amount of violent crimes. There was a board that held members of different professions to measure the variables and the results were astounding. “The maximum decrease was 23.3% when the size of the group was largest during the final week of the project. The statistical probability that this result could reflect chance variation in crime levels was less than 2 in 1 billion (p < .000000002),” (http://www.istpp.org/crime_prevention). Since the population of Washington D.C. is 572,059 people according to the 2,000 Census(http://www.homesparadise.com/homes/washington-dc/washington-dc.php), it took less than one percent of the population to decrease violent crime by 23.3%. In the book Power Vs. Force by Dr. Hawkins(2002) confirms this probability, “the influence of a few individuals of advanced consciousness counterbalances entire populations at the lower levels”(p.101). Our connection and influence on each other is undeniable. “As we have believed in the lie of asmita, the lie of disconnection, we must now believe in the magnificent reality of spiritual connection,”( Gates & Kenison, 2002, p.159). The results of the DC study make me consider that perhaps violent crimes are not just because basic needs are not being met. This means spiritual needs have not been met. Where as someone with a basic need of food may steal bread, they may not kill for the bread. A spiritual injury or starvation may be the root of needs for violence. Without spiritual food, wherever we find it, the world is a dark place. “The hot stoves are the pain that we mistake for pleasure, the impure that we believe to be pure, the impermanent that we mistake for permanent, the things outside ourselves that we allow to define us,”(Gates & Kenison, 2002, p. 150). Since we are all connected, it is equally our job to help heal each other since in healing someone else we heal our self and like wise. I am curious to the results of a DC project on a larger scale such as for the entire United States of America. Would it make a difference if the one percent doing the Transcendental Meditation were in one area or spread out? I wonder if the interest would be there to perform the experiment on such a grand scale? Is there any influence on crime rates in areas that have a multitude of spiritual congregations already gathering? There are so many potentials for healing our self, others, and the world. It is almost terrifying to think of where to start. We each must start within our self. As Eudora Welty said, “All serious daring starts from within”( Gates & Kenison, 2002, p. 151). Prayer and meditation are tools that we have been blessed with to create the change we want to see in the world. There is an incredible journey ahead full of mystical happenings and adventure that we can not even yet conceive. In this unfolding, we must remember our interconnectedness. That we all affect each other. Our actions to toward the planet and others is doing the same thing to us. I have seen how prayer and meditation have effected me individually, with others, and on larger scales such as the DC study. I am inspired and excited to see our true spiritual natures emerging. It is clear as Swami Amar Jyoti said, “Each body is a universe, as good a universe as you could conceive,” (Gates & Kenison, 2002, p. 122). Everything is originally good, we just became weird and twisted along the way. We need to return to those beginnings. When wars, hate, and violence are erupting all around us we have to remember “When we are in hell, we are always that close to heaven, that close to our divinity”(Gates & Kenison, p. 124). All we have to do is take that next step. Reference: Gates, R. & Kenison, K. (2002). Meditations from the Mat. New York: Anchor Books. Handout from Psychology 303 on the Color Purple. Summer Semester 2005. Sonoma State University. Hawkins, D. (2002). Power Vs. Force. Carlsbad: Hay House Inc. Information on 2002 Census last found on 06/28/05 http://www.homesparadise.com/homes/washington-dc/washington- dc.php Information on the DC Study last found on 06/28/05 http://www.istpp.org/crime_prevention Naranjo, C. (1993).GESTALT THERAPY The Attitude & Practice of an Atheoretical Experientialism. Nevada City: Gateways/IDHHB Publishing. Schiffman, Erich. (2005) Excerpt of Moving Into Stillness. Reader Psychology of Yoga. Spring Semester. Sonoma State University. Netscape. Just the Net You Need.